‘We have always been here’

It’s Sámi National Day throughout Sápmi – the Sámi homelands – which stretch across present-day Sweden, Norway, Finland and Russia’s Kola Peninsula.

Sámi National Day celebrates the solidarity, strength and resilience of Europe’s only recognised Indigenous people. The date, 6 February, was chosen to commemorate the first national meeting in 1917 when hundreds of Sámi people crossed state borders to gather in Trondheim, Norway.

While Canada is an important reference point for Australia’s work addressing truth and justice, Sámi struggles for rights in the Nordic states are also instructive (though...